The Effects of Maternal Atrazine Exposure and Swimming Training on Spatial Learning Memory and Hippocampal Morphology in Offspring Male Rats via PSD95/NR2B Signaling Pathway

Jun 13, 2019Cellular and molecular neurobiology

How Mother’s Atrazine Exposure and Swimming Exercise Affect Male Offspring’s Spatial Memory and Hippocampus Structure through Synapse Signaling

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Abstract

Maternal exposure to Atrazine (ATR) is associated with impaired spatial learning and memory in offspring male rats.

Maternal ATR exposure during gestation and lactation damages hippocampal morphology and reduces gene and protein expression related to learning and memory.
Behavioral tests indicate significant impairment in spatial learning and memory due to maternal ATR exposure.
A longer swimming training period of 28 days leads to greater improvements in learning and memory function than an 8-day training period.
The neuroprotective effect of swimming training may involve the PSD95/NR2B signaling pathway.

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Atrazine (ATR), a widely used herbicide, has been previously shown to damage spatial memory capability and the hippocampus of male rats during the development. It has also been indicated that physical exercise can improve learning and memory in both humans and animals, as a neuroprotective method. Our aim here was to investigate the effect of maternal ATR exposure during gestation and lactation on spatial learning and memory function and hippocampal morphology in offspring and to further evaluate the neuroprotective effect of swimming training and identify possible related learning and memory signaling pathways. Using Sprague-Dawley rats, we examined behavioral and molecular biology effects associated with maternal ATR exposure, as well as the effects of 8 or 28 days swimming training. Maternal exposure to ATR was found to impair spatial learning and memory by behavioral test, damage the hippocampal morphology, and reduce related genes and proteins expression of learning and memory in the hippocampus. The extended, 28 days, period of swimming training produced a greater amelioration of the adverse effects of ATR exposure than the shorter, 8 days, training period. Our results suggest that maternal ATR exposure may damage the spatial learning and memory of offspring male rats via PSD95/NR2B signaling pathway. The negative effect of ATR could be at least partially reversed by swimming training, pointing to a potential neuroprotective role of physical exercise in nervous system diseases accompanying by learning and memory deficit.

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The Effects of Maternal Atrazine Exposure and Swimming Training on Spatial Learning Memory and Hippocampal Morphology in Offspring Male Rats via PSD95/NR2B Signaling Pathway

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